t to
resign himself, through a pair of cold, unillusory barnacles. As for the
things beyond the hearth, if he cannot see without spectacles, is he
not about to ally to his own defective vision a good sharp pair of eyes,
never at fault where his interests are concerned? On the other hand,
regarded positively, categorically, and explicitly, Dr. Roccabocca, by
laying aside those spectacles, signified that he was about to commence
that happy initiation of courtship when every man, be he ever so much a
philosopher, wishes to look as young and as handsome as time and nature
will allow. Vain task to speed the soft language of the eyes through the
medium of those glassy interpreters! I remember, for my own part, that
once, on a visit to the town of Adelaide, I--Pisistratus Caxton--was in
great danger of falling in love,--with a young lady, too, who would have
brought me a very good fortune,--when she suddenly produced from her
reticule a very neat pair of No. 4, set in tortoiseshell, and fixing
upon me their Gorgon gaze, froze the astonished Cupid into stone! And
I hold it a great proof of the wisdom of Riccabocca, and of his vast
experience in mankind, that he was not above the consideration of what
your pseudo-sages would have regarded as foppish and ridiculous trifles.
It argued all the better for that happiness which is our being's end
and aim that in condescending to play the lover, he put those unbecoming
petrifiers under lock and key.

And certainly, now the spectacles were abandoned, it was impossible to
deny that the Italian had remarkably handsome eyes. Even through the
spectacles, or lifted a little above them, they were always bright and
expressive; but without those adjuncts, the blaze was softer and more
tempered: they had that look which the French call veloute, or velvety;
and he appeared altogether ten years younger. If our Ulysses, thus
rejuvenated by his Minerva, has not fully made up his mind to make
a Penelope of Miss Jemima, all I can say is, that he is worse than
Polyphemus, who was only an Anthropophagos,--

He preys upon the weaker sex, and is a Gynopophagite!

CHAPTER XXIII.

"And you commission me, then, to speak to our dear Jemima?" said Mrs.
Dale, joyfully, and without any bitterness whatever in that "dear."

DR. RICCABOCCA.--"Nay, before speaking to Miss Hazeldean, it would
surely be proper to know how far my addresses would be acceptable to the
family."

MRS. DALE.--"Ah!"

DR. RICCA